New Philadelphia stage productions  that interpret major moments in women’s health are the topic of a Google HangOut virtual press conference going on from 2 p.m. today.

Part and parcel of the time traveling,  Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts, the groups Pasion y arte Flamenco and Fresh Blood will be delving into the saga of the world’s first gynecologist – based in Salerno – in a dance and music performance installation playing at the Fleischer Art Memorial, April 5-7.

Guiding lights of the Penn Dixie Productions will be ruminating about their “Animal Animal Mammal Mine” work which marks the FDA approval of the birth control pill in 1960. That mixed media work is being presented April 10-20 at Underground Arts, 1200 Callowhill.

One of the least telling “teaser” commercials for a new product hit the web yesterday for the Samsung Galaxy S IV smart phone. But there might be something to the final shot, when a young boy opens the box and makes dazzling eye contact with the phone.

According to the ever reliable “informed sources,” Samsung’s next great smart phone has a unique eye tracking feature – trademarked “Eye Scroll”  -   that keeps tabs on what you’re watching and automatically rolls the text on the screen, like your own private TelePrompTer operator.  Then when your eyes  hit the bottom of a page of text, the phone magically jumps to the next.

 Samsung’s current Galaxy S III  already deploys the front camera  to watch the user and respond productively. Called “Stay Smart,” the feature keeps the screen lit at full intensity when you’re gawking at it, over-riding  the battery-save screen  dimming feature.  

The enormously talented and energetic  Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson has achieved much – as a virtuoso drummer for The Roots and others, as a producer, arranger, “Late Night with Jimmy Fallon” bandleader (also with The Roots), club DJ, composer, Philadelphia music festival curator and  culinary entrepreneur.

Now the West Philly native is adding “author” to his resume with “Mo Meta Blues: The World According to Questlove,” due out June 18 on the Grande Central Publishing imprint.

Bearing a title evoking a Spike Lee joint, an op-art cover  that  echoes an historic  representation of   Bob  Dylan, and a “punch drunk memoir” style that may also win Dylan comparisons, the tome was written with New Yorker editor Ben Greenman.

A  time machine is under construction  at the Kimmel Center, a massive, high tech sculptural, light, sound and video installation signifying  . . . all kinds of stuff.

Stretching more than 100 feet through the Commonwealth Plaza, snaking from the Kimmel;s front door to the entry way to Verizon Hall, the tunnel of past, present and future imagery (and sounds) is the physical centerpiece of the Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts  (March 28-April 27).  And just one of many free treats that hopefully will draw visitors in on a daily basis.

While the  swirling, custom steel grid work  is mostly up and the time tunnel  will likely  be enclosed by week's end, “we’ve got a month to fine tune what goes inside,” said production designer Robert Pyzocha. His team has been brainstorming about the TM  since last September and put out a heady artistic proposal which excited regional executives/funders  at Dow Chemical, also major sponsors of the Franklin Institute-backed Science Festival returning in April.  

Might your idea of a romantic Valentine’s Day evening include a wine and cheese tasting , a unique portrait session and a semi-private tour of  Philadelphia’s spiffy new  high tech DIY shared workspace?

If so, you’re going to want to spend Valentine’s Day with NextFab, a special event hosted by facility founder Evan Malone and  his equally busy, restaurant and bar-tending  wife,  Jill Weber.

Drawing  attention to the new, much larger and loaded with gear NextFab facility at 2025 Washington Ave., this geekfully romantic evening begins  with professional photographer Rachel Lynn Kotkoskie capturing your photo. The image will then be laser-etched on the premises onto a porcelain ceramic tile as your keepsake takeaway.

A new version of the Public Radio Player launched on the Apple apps store this morning, making it a whole lot easier to keep up with some of our  favorite public radio shows – including the Philadelphia based (and nationally syndicated)  “Fresh Air with Terry Gross,”   and local  news magazine “Radio Times” from WHYY. Oddly unavailable, though, were the same radio station’s  always entertaining  “You Bet Your Garden” hosted by my keepin' it green bud Mike McGrath and  WXPN’s big national calling card “World Café” with David Dye.

It was Gross herself who turned me onto the PRP app, after a chance encounter at the supermarket when I mourned I was no longer in the car every night listening to her 7 p.m. repeat. “So why not listen to the internet version  on your iPhone, while you’re on the bus or walking home?” she suggested.

The free Public Radio Player lets you hone in to stations by content or location  - in Philly also giving instant and preset access to WRTI’s classical and jazz streams and both primary and secondary (HD) channels from WXPN.

Go-green initiatives from the Philadelphia Phillies and Drexel University  (what, no Eagles?) have helped jump start the Keystone Solar farm into being. And today to a “2013 Project of  Distinction” honor at the PV America East 2013  trade  show meeting at the Pennsylvania Convention Center.

Keystone Solar is the state’s largest solar panel project, harvesting some 8,000 megawatt hours of sun juice per year. At the PV (Photovoltaic) show today, this Lancaster County install was cited  as a “tribute to innovative energy marketing and exemplary project development.” The former reflects on Keystone Solar’s securing of a 15 year power purchase agreement with Exelon Generation with the backing of retail energy buys by high profile entities  including the Phillies and Drexel, plus Franklin & Marshall College, Juniata College, Millersville University, the Clean Air Council and others.

More interesting to a techie is the “project development” aspect  of the honor – detailing how solar farm developers worked with the Lancaster County agricultural community to support farmland preservation and soil restoration.

 Another consumer electronics giant  officially bailed out on the cut-throat business in audio and video products yesterday. Who’s next?

The bad news came from Royal Philips, the European biggie (based in the Netherlands) that dreamed up  the compact cassette, collaborated with Sony on the CD and is deep in the DVD/Blu-ray disc patent pool.  A couple years ago, Philips handed off the manufacturing and marketing of TV sets to the Japanese based Funai and yesterday announced the spin-off of Philips audio and accessories businesses too, in return for a healthy royalty for use of the brand name.

 A Funai executive suggested that the old Philips gang would still have input on new Philips product designs, but Funai hasn’t taken much of their advice lately. Its’ 2013 Philips-branded  TV line for the U.S. has no 3-D models, none with Philips cool “Ambilight” rear illumination  enhancement  and none in the ultra-wide screen 21:9 TV format which Philips introduced in Europe, that Vizio brought to the States and which LG showed at this CES in a very handsome, $700 computer monitor.

We know from perusing  Facebook pages who’s got too much time on their hands. But can we also gauge our friends’  mental state?

 A new study by researchers at the University  of Missouri suggests that what users include and even don’t include on Facebook can signal mental symptoms,  issues of concern.

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